Missionary – Des Moines, Iowa 6/2015 – 1/2017

Month: May 2016

Hello Family and Friends! 🙂 I hope all is well with you all! 🙂 Things are going well for us! Some exciting news is we had a Baptism! 🙂 Shyann Ashby! She’s the younger sister of Alison Ashby (We helped her be baptized in march) But Shyann was afraid of the water, but after a couple months of working with her she was finally baptized last week! 🙂 Woot Woot!! 😀

Other things that happened this week is we went to Zone Training Meeting and had some good trainings! I thought it was awesome because they told me I could do a spiritual thought on anything I wanted. And then the topic I picked (Endure to the End) went along with what eveyone was talking about! It was a tender mercy for me that even prayers as simple as, “Help me know what topic to talk about” are answered. 🙂 Sometimes I just feel so very much loved by my Father in Heaven. 😀

We’ve been crazy busy this last week. Just running around everywhere like Chickens with no heads!! 🙂 On Saturday we were so busy that we didn’t even have time for lunch or dinner… we just packed snacks in the car and tried to eat in-between appointments… Crazy sauce… But aside from that we’ve also been having so much fun! We’re talking to a lot of new people and teaching many lessons 🙂 Its awesome to see people progress and its heartbreaking to see them drop us… but hey! Its all apart of life!

We’ve been working really hard on our Marhsalltown Hunger games and the whole ward is really excited for it! 🙂 This will be a great opportunity for us to build relationships with the community. 🙂 and with the Ward. 🙂 its been a great week! I love you all!

I hope you all had a really good day yesterday for Mother’s day 🙂 I know I did. 🙂 It was nice to talk to the family again. I can’t believe how tall Lizzie is… Crazy Sauce!

Anyway…

This week was great! except… I was sick on Monday… Yuck… 😛 But hey Sister Steinback saved my companion from complete boredom so that’s good right? 🙂

But Tuesday! we found 4 new investigators! Brittany and Shawn! and its funny because even though we share the same name, it doesn’t really feel like my name anymore… I’m sister Pope haha 🙂 But they are super cool! they have family who are members of the church and they really want this! although… they do live 45 min away… so it will be a sacrifice to come to church. but they know its important so It’ll be okay 🙂

Also… remember that one time bishop took us missionaries out to lunch and then left us there? … Well he did it again! That Dork… Anyway so awkward date #2 with the elders… 😛 at least it was good food.

Friday we had interviews with president and that was great! 🙂 Its his last interview with us before they go home from their mission. He’s such a great man. I’m going to miss him and Sister Jensen.

This week was Mother’s day and it was so great! The members keep bringing us Rhubarb and We don’t have any recipes or anything… so we’ve taken to just eating it raw. 🙂 Its like sour celery haha 🙂 good times being a missionary!.

This week i’ve been ponderizing Alma 22:15-18. I love these scriptures because of King Lamoni. He would give up half his kingdom for his life, but for eternal life he would give up everything. I love pondering that and thinking about how I can apply that to me.

Well I love you all! Thanks for all you do for me! I hope you have a marvelous week!

This was another great week for Sister Pope and Sister Thorn! 😀 We found a new investigator Rafael Flores and he and his mom came to church this week! 🙂 He’s 8 and ADHD haha so lessons are always exciting! We’ve been teaching the book of mormon by acting it out! and I”m always the bad guy. Or the guy who has the most dramatic death… 🙂 its a good time! Our next lesson is on Nephi and Laban lol 🙂 But he remembers the things we teach him especially when we use analogies and he wants to “Level up” by getting the Holy Ghost. 🙂 He’ll be baptized on May 14 🙂

The Johnsons are doing so good! I’m so happy to have had the opportunity to work with them! John bore his testimony this sunday and he really talked up us missionaries. 🙂 it made my whole day. Then during 2nd hour Rafael went missing… and His Mom (Shanna) was having a panic attack. We had people driving around looking for him and it was pretty scary. Come to find out… He was in the only classroom we had all forgotten to look in the 3-6 year old class. He wasn’t missing at all. we all felt pretty silly, but we knew that Heavenly Father answered our prayers. Rafa was Safe and we all grew closer together as a ward family. 🙂 What a blessing.

Also John Johnson has the best youth activity Idea! The HUNGER GAMES!! and he has a pretty good following already so there will be at least 50 non members. Its so exciting! Bishop approved it and Mission president approved it! and now we just have to do it before I leave Marshalltown… 🙂 Sister Thorn and I are going to be in charge of one of the districts. Probably District 4 and the Elders will also and its going to be huge! 🙂 I’m so excited about it! John will do the lesson afterwards and then introduce us missionaries and we’ll let the kids take home book of mormon (s), pass along cards, pamplets, you name it! It will be a great finding opportunity for us! 😀

Anyway! Ponderizing is still a thing 😉 this week i’m doing Alma 56:47-48 because its about the stripling warriors and their moms 🙂

I love you all! Thanks for all the Love and support you give me! I know this Gospel is true and I know that we can all receive answers to our prayers. We just need to be patient and follow the spirit. I love missionary work and i’m grateful to be out here serving the Lord. There is Nothing else i’d rather be doing at this time in my life! 🙂

Its very good to hear from you all! 🙂 I want you to know how much I enjoy reading about your lives and I don’t know if you know this but life as a missionary is really hard… so I am grateful for all the love and support you all give me. Thank you! 🙂

Also! No transfer this week! I’ll be here in Marshalltown until June 9th! Because this is a 7 week transfer! 🙂 Sister Thorn and I are both happy with it! haha Pretty much I’ll be a year old in the mission before I leave. Maybe i’ll only have 3 areas my whole mission… Who knows!

So this week I’d say our biggest Miracle is Max Levis, he is the grandpa of a missionary serving from our ward. (He’s in California) But we’ve been teaching him. Yay! Right now he’s the only member of his family a member. so its pretty cool 🙂

Also this week we were able to have a Zone Pday! and That was so fun! Although… I didn’t appreciate that the Elders wouldn’t let us sisters play football… They don’t understand how good I am at football… -_- “too much contact” they said… LAME! But its okay! Because we sisters went Bowling!! HAHA! Take that Elders! haha 🙂 We had a good time and I got to see Sister Baransky again! 🙂 She’s doing well! Her Sister’s been Emailing her and sending her stuff 🙂 slowly but surely her mom will come around I know it! 🙂 Also with Zone P day we played basketball, volleyball, and scatterball. 🙂 Its fun because I don’t think the Elder’s expect the competitiveness that comes with Sister Pope… haha 🙂 I enjoy it immensely. and i’ve got some pretty sick bruises 🙂 They are purple and its awesome!

Its been a pretty rough week but we kept trucking on! and I was doing pretty well until Friday… my companion got sick, and I was stuck in the apartment all day… with nothing but my own thoughts for company… (My comp was sleeping) and then I didn’t know what else to do so I called Sister Jensen and she made me feel better 🙂 She gave me some talks I needed to read and then gave us permission to drive to stake conference so she could hug us. 🙂 So we went Saturday night for Stake Conference 🙂 That was pretty cool. but on Sunday we decided we were going to watch the broadcast in Marshalltown 🙂 That was a good choice because Sister Thorn was dying haha 🙂 Just of allergies but she was not good enough to go out… Hopefully this week is better! I pray it is! I love you all!! Thank you again for all you do!!

I’m still Ponderizing Ya’ll! 1Nephi 7:21 I love it because of how Nephi is able to forgive his brothers so easily. 🙂 “I did Frankly Forgive them” I’ve been working on forgiveness this week and I know that there is joy that comes from letting go of grudges and allow the atonement to work in your life. I know there is so much power in the atonement. Keep working hard my friends and remember that I love yoU!

All my love,

Sister Brittany Pope

ps. The picture is of a inactive girl, we did her hair for prom. 😉 Sisters can do things Elders just can’t. #SistersForTheWin

So this week was pretty great! we’re looking for some new investigators so that means lots of finding! Woot Woot! 🙂 But we’ve had a great week! We taught a lady who learned from missionaries in the past and she has a picture of the temple framed on the wall. it was pretty cool to see. 🙂 Then I learned the correct way to eat tacos. (Just so you know, we’ve been doing it wrong) haha but it was the best food I’ve eaten! haha Well… Maybe I just love Tacos. 🙂 And don’t worry Mom I put Guac on everything. That counts as a vegetable right? 😉

So funny story time! First off we aren’t allowed to be at the same house as the elders at the same time unless they are apart of the ward council. (to be effectively use our time as missionaries.) Anyways! Bishop invited us and the Elders out for dinner last Monday, but he had to cancel last minute. So we had to rescheduled for Wednesday and about an hour before we were supposed to be at the Chinese restaurant He calls us and tells us that he’s not going to make it, but still wants to feed us so he called the restaurant and paid for 4 missionaries to eat. So… We pretty much went on a date with the Elders… Lol it was so funny. Awkward but so funny. 🙂

And another cool story! we had achieved all our goals for the day so we decided to reward ourselves with Swinging at the park. And of course that means we bring our bubbles too 😉 haha So we were blowing bubbles in the park swinging on the swing set and then out of the blue 6 little kids come screaming out of no where “BUBBLES!!!” Then they try to pop them all 🙂 It was so cute and probably one of my favorite memories of being a missionary!

Well my Dear friends, I want you to know that I know this church is true! I know that Joseph Smith truly was a prophet called of God and that our current prophet President Monson is God’s mouth piece for us today. I’m grateful for the words of the prophet and I pray that we can continue to read them and apply them in our lives today 🙂 Choose the Harder Right, even when its hard. I know that the lord will bless us in our trials and help us to overcome anything! My Ponderize Scripture this week is Mosiah 24:14. The Lord truly does visit us in our afflictions and he will ease our burdens, not take them away but strengthen us so that we can bear them! I Love you all! Have an Amazing week!